This year’s Biking Tour was
very different to those in the past.The
main difference was that it wasn’t an itinerant tour run in stages but a
series of selected “circuits” run in pre-selected areas.Sardinia’s coastal landscapes
featured highly in previous Tours.In
2002 the Tour covered the Western coastline and in 2003 we rode along the
Eastern shores.This time,
however, we concentrated on the mountains of Central Sardinia and we only saw
the sea once during one of the 8 stages of the Tour.Having chosen mountainous areas also
meant there were other differences in the way the Tour was run.The majority of the stages of our tour
ran along paved and unpaved tracks and cart-roads, with absolutely no stress
due to automobile traffic, although we must point out that few Sardinian roads
are very busy in June.The high
slopes and variations in altitude involved (which unfortunately we were unable
to calculate in advance due to lack of time) were, without doubt, more
demanding than the previous tours.In
the end, we only covered 300 kilometres, compared to the previous years’
approximately 400Kms but obviously, this year’s trek was much tougher.

The previous years’ coastal
excursions enabled us to stop over in accommodation facilities consisting
mainly of camping grounds.This type of accommodation, however, is not available in
Sardinia’s inland areas so this time we utilised traditional or
farm-tourism-style accommodation.

Only two of us (Tore and myself)
participated in the whole tour but Monica, Valeria and Gianfranco joined us
for the first two days.I believe that the ideal number of participants in this type
of adventure varies from 4 to 6.Any
number greater than that would require external organisational support for the
cycling group.However, having
too few participants also diminishes the pleasure of sharing the special
moments that occur along the way (unless, of course, the two participants are
the likes of Laurel and Hardy or Abbot and Costello, etc.).

The group of participants in its entirety.From the left, Tore, Gianfranco, Monica, Giorgio and Valeria.

Even the weather, unfortunately,
wasn’t the best.The period
involved, from 29 May to 5 June 2004, was definitely cloudier, colder and
wetter than usual during that time of the year (in short, we were just plain
unlucky).Having chosen the
mountainous areas just amplified any problem we ran into along the way, rather
like if the sun was shining elsewhere, up on the mountain we would find clouds
or if it was cloudy elsewhere, we would find ourselves in a thunderstorm.Nevertheless, Sardinia is still one of
the most beautiful places in the world to go cycling and even the imperfect
weather didn’t spoil our enjoyment too much.After all, a rainstorm in June is never as bad as one in February and
we came home rather tanned anyway.

How we decided on our itinerary

A lot of work went into the
selection of our itinerary this year.As
I’ve already mentioned, we mainly chose mountain paths.It wasn’t an easy task because we’re
talking about venturing into areas where signposts are practically
non-existent and very far from each other, not to mention the lack of local
maps.I am obviously referring to
possible operational problems along the way.As far as our safety was concerned, I must stress that we
weren’t at all concerned.Sardinia
is the most hospitable and safest place I have ever visited.

The areas we selected went from
the Southern Barbagia region to the Island of Caprera and we therefore needed
to study a vast section of the Region.A
regional road map was sufficient to study the more straightforward paved road
portion of the itinerary and enabled us to make those inevitable last-minute
changes without any further need for cartographic support.For the mountain routes, however, IGM
[Military Survey Office] maps on a scale of 1:25:000 at least are required.Be careful though because these maps
do not feature all the information a cyclist needs and it is dangerous to rely
on them completely.In fact, the
out-of-the-way paths are not detailed on the IGM maps and often, cart-roads
that appear to be important on these maps end up being impassable roadways,
which have been abandoned for decades and blocked by heaps of stones.At the same time, it is also likely
that perfectly viable paths do not appear on these maps.To avoid this problem, cross-checks
were done with the orthophotomaps produced by the AGEA [Agency for
Agricultural Subsidies] (black and white flight 1997) and CGR TerraItaly
(flight colour 1998).Another
issue, which must not be forgotten, is the necessity to plan for modifications
to the itinerary caused by various factors, such as unforeseen circumstances,
poor weather conditions, information found on site and blocked roads, etc.In some cases, above all if one isn’t perfectly familiar
with every single part of the itinerary and there isn’t an expert guide
accompanying the group at every single location, certain variants, which are
sometimes significant, must be taken into consideration.That is why it is necessary to prepare
alternative itineraries that can be linked to the original ones selected.This further complicates the itinerary
selection work but I can assure you that it will resolve many problems if
necessary.Don’t set off with a tiny map of the area through which you
intend to travel.Arm yourself
with a map covering a wider area.

All the maps we used
can be found on the Internet at the www.atlanteitaliano.it
site.These cross-checks still
leave some areas of doubt.Although
the photographic resolution is excellent, it is not possible to be certain
that the road surfaces are viable.The
road’s actual existence and size is verifiable but this doesn’t guarantee
it is transitable.Let’s take
into account getting off the bike a few times to push up over a pile of rocks.Furthermore, a photograph tends to
“flatten” an area and one risks underestimating the difficulty of certain
inclines.We would advise those perfectionists who may have a little
time at their disposal to equip themselves with a digital model of the
countryside and by using an excellent program like Oziexplorer, to produce
altimetric graphs that plot the routes.Unfortunately,
we didn’t have the time to do this so we’re not in a position to furnish
you with the exact data on the altimetries and gradients of our itineraries.

Our secret weapon deserves our
last acknowledgement.The Garmin GPS Receiver (Etrex - basic model) is like a small
toy cell phone, which has now become very affordable for most people (approx.
150 Euro).This gadget’s
unlimited features assisted us in finding our way a number of times when it
would have been just as easy to go off on a tangent.Without this electronic support
system, it would really have been a problem for us to complete the 8 stages of
our Sardinian itinerary, each of which were so far from each other.When the cost becomes even more
accessible and the more evolved positioning equipment develops to the point of
having storage capacity capable of giving access to all of the basic
cartography necessary (even secondary paths), it will be even more difficult
to make mistakes.I suppose we
will laugh in a few years’ time when we look back and think about the
positioning verifications we had to carry out at numerous crossroads.How did we utilise the smallest of the
Garmin Etrex receivers?We
programmed a few hundred key points of our itinerary into the unit,
particularly those formidable crossroads where it is so easy to get lost.Those points were then transferred
onto a detailed paper map.I
believe the results were very positive and it was only when we didn’t put
our trust in the electronic instrument that we made a few little blunders.We would advise anyone who is planning
to journey over the mountains with only paper maps as support to be aware that
in reality, you could find yourself in numerous situations that don’t
correspond to this type of map.In
other words, don’t rely on maps that aren’t designed to support travel
through mountain paths and hiking because it would be very, very easy to get
lost.Obviously we are not
asserting that the local guides are useless.On the contrary, a guide would take you to the best spots and assist
you in appreciating the area you are visiting to the fullest.

The choice of locations

Since the itinerary was no longer
tied to stopovers this year our selection criteria was mainly based on
sightseeing aspects.From this
point of view, Sardinia offers a significant number possibilities and I
believe it would have been possible to hundreds of different itineraries, all
of them magnificent.We needed about 8 plus a couple in reserve.

One aspect taken
into consideration was whether we would be travelling through protected areas
such as regional parks or reserves managed by the Azienda Foreste Demaniali della Sardegna [AFD
- Sardinian forests and state property supervisory body].These areas are can always be found in
locations, which are extremely valuable from a landscape and nature point of
view.Furthermore, the AFD
maintains the pathway network very efficiently and the cyclist can nearly
always be certain to find the unpaved roads in excellent condition.We would find beautiful areas even in
the areas surrounding the protected sites but we must be careful not to cross
private properties, which may be closed even to cyclists and could stop us
from continuing our journey.The
gates to these properties are not marked on the maps and they can’t be seen
in aerial photos either.It is
important to note that not all government land is open for transit to cyclists
and that officially, permission should be requested in advance.This applies to the Sos Littos Sas Tumbas Forest in particular, where our presence was
barely tolerated.Having
discussed the matter, the participants decided to recommend the following
itineraries:

Clicking on the above links will
enable you to the pages dedicated to each individual side trip and numerous
photos.

The accommodation

Whilst not wanting to make
judgements on the accommodation (that is not our role), we as the average
client would like to share some considerations on this topic.We stayed in three different types of
accommodation, i.e., a very modest one-star half board hotel (cost: 30 Euro
per person), a three-star half board hotel (cost: approx. €45 per person)
and farm holiday accommodation (cost: approx. €45 per person).Our impression of the hotels was that
they had been given one star too many, compared to what they deserved.As far as the farm holiday
accommodation is concerned, we had booked two completely different
establishments.We would like to
point out that it is quite possible to find smelly stable-like accommodation,
which costs more than a three-star hotel and at the same time, other
establishments very similar to those same hotels.The first type of accommodation is a
rip-off.The difference between
that and farm holiday accommodation could be that the food is generally of
better quality in the latter.However,
any farm holiday accommodation would obviously be located far away from any
township and this may not suit those who are interested in experiencing the
rather special atmosphere that exists in the small towns of inland Sardinia.We would also point out that contrary
to popular belief, the food served at the farm holiday accommodation is hardly
ever prepared with locally grown produce.It is simply good or adequate home cooking and the
ingredients appear to be very similar to those normally found on the market.

The climate

As previously mentioned, we were
not particularly lucky as far as the weather was concerned.The week after we returned, however,
it was perfect.It may have even
been too hot for an excursion along the coast but probably ideal for the
mountainous areas we had visited.When
we were on the Bruncu Spina (at
1,500m. ASL), the temperature was 8 degrees Centigrade, which is a little cold
for the month of June. Obviously
the problem was never really the cold as much as the fact that with all the
low black clouds, we were unable to enjoy the magnificent views that the
Gennargentu and Limbara Mountains would have offered. It is a known fact that it is quite
impossible to make long-term weather forecasts.Notwithstanding, we still believe that this period between 15 May and
15 June is the ideal time for this type of cycling tour.In fact, our tours have always been scheduled for this period.